A framed painting by Edgar Degas entitled "At the Race, the Start".

Edgar Degas (19 July 1834 to 27 September 1917) was a French artist famous for his paintings, sculptures, prints, and drawings. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism, although he rejected the term, preferring to be called a realist. During his life, public reception of his work ranged from admiration to contempt. As a promising artist in the conventional mode, Degas had a number of paintings accepted in the Salon between 1865 and 1870. These works received praise from Pierre Puvis de Chavannes and the critic Jules Antoine Castagnary. He soon joined forces with the Impressionists, however, and rejected the rigid rules, judgements, and elitism of the Salon, just as the Salon and general public initially rejected the experimentalism of the Impressionists.